Disneyland Hotel Review: Americas Best Value Inn & Suites
Americas Best Value Inn & Suites Convention Center is a motel in Anaheim that’s about a 12 minute walk to Disneyland and is one of the cheapest hotels near Disneyland. This hotel review features room photos, thoughts on amenities, and a look at the pros and cons of staying at Americas Best Value Inn & Suites as compared to its competitors near Disneyland and the Anaheim Convention Center. The post also covers how you can get a deal on the hotel.
This is one motel that puts it all out there with its name. There’s no subtlety here, as it boldly proclaims it is the “best value” in the United States. It does so with a cavalier disregard of grammar and punctuation, putting all potential guests on notice that this motel blazes its own trails and makes its own rules. That, or perhaps the apostrophe in “America’s” would have cost extra, and they wanted to get the BEST VALUE.
Whatever the case may be, this truly is a budget motel meant for travelers who want a no-frills stay on their visit to Disneyland. My initial impression of Americas Best Value Inn was not all that positive, but after some more experience I don’t think it’s terrible. (“Not terrible”, what a ringing endorsement!) To be frank, there’s absolutely nothing special about Americas Best Value Inn & Suites Convention Center, but it fills an important niche.
I originally pointed to Americas Best Value Inn’s #16 ranking on TripAdvisor (it has since slipped to #22) as demonstrative of the unreliability of that site. There’s probably some irony in the fact that I now rank it higher than TripAdvisor (in fairness, they rank many more hotels than me), which you can see in our Disneyland Hotels Reviews & Rankings post. You can also read our overall comparison of the benefits of staying off-site versus on-site in our Where to Stay at Disneyland post.
If money is no object, this is not the #16 or even #22 hotel in Anaheim. It wouldn’t even crack the top 50. However, for those on a tight budget who only want a place to crash and would like to be within walking distance of Disneyland and Disney California Adventure, it’s a serviceable option. It’s in a fairly safe location and the hotel management seemed trustworthy to me. UPDATE: See comment from reader ‘dan’ below who has some rather disturbing remarks about Americas Best Value Inn. You might want to heed these cautionary tales, as it’s better to spend another $10/night than to risk staying at an unscrupulous hotel.
Let’s take a look at the rooms to see why…
Okay, so the room looks clean enough and spacious, and it was. On the downside, it smelled like they carpet bombed the place with Febreeze to mask the smell of smoke. It’s like the motel equivalent of the dude who thinks AXE is a shower in a can.
There’s also the issue of when “spacious” crosses the line into “cavernous.” There was a good 8-10 feet gap between the bed and television, and it was too small to watch from bed. If you wanted a good view, you’d have to sit on the floor. (Hope you don’t mind your shorts smelling like carpet cleaner!)
On the plus side, there was a fridge, microwave, and coffee maker in this odd little breakfast nook type area. Also on the plus side, the room was well-lit (these photos are pretty much straight out of camera, a rarity for hotel room photos) and colorful. I’m being genuine–often I find cheap motel rooms to be dim, dank, and depressing.
The bedding was also better than I expected of a budget motel. By that, I mean I couldn’t feel any springs and it didn’t seem like the mattress was older than me. It still was far from the most comfortable sleep I’ve ever had, but it was fine. Not noticeably good or bad. The pillows were actually somewhat good, surprisingly.
To get from the main room to the bathroom, you passed through this large closet-type area, which was almost as large as the bathroom. I have never seen a hotel make such poor use of space.
The bathroom was fine, albeit small. It would have been nice for some of the superfluous space in the main rooms to have been allocated to this instead. The biggest downside was that I believe the towels were purchased at SCRATCH-R-US.
The shower was unimpressive, but got the job done. Included toiletries were also low quality.
To my surprise, the pool actually looked halfway decent. Note that this is by Anaheim standards where most hotel pools look like they might be a carrier of a communicable disease. I’d give this pool “probably disease-free” status (high praise indeed), but I wasn’t going to risk it. Sorry, readers, I don’t like you that much. Here are some fun facts about ‘healthy swimming’ if you find my “sarcasm” about hotel pools off-putting.
There’s also a little fountain and tree in the courtyard of the Americas Best Value Inn & Suites Convention Center, but that’s about it as far as amenities go. Oh, there’s also free parking, free WiFi, and a very basic cold item breakfast, which are probably more important to you than this fountain.
Not exactly a glowing review thus far, but price and proximity are totally the reasons to book Americas Best Value Inn. I could book a room there tonight, during summer break season for $79. In looking at booking sites, most of the other decent walking distance options are all around $139/night. (Ironically, there is a $3/night resort fee here. This is comically hilarious, but since it’s only $3, I’ll spare you my normal rant about resort fees. I’m just left wondering, “what’s the point?” with a fee that low. Maybe it’s a joke?)
Overall, Americas Best Value Inn & Suites is a ‘sleep & shower’ crash pad that doesn’t pretend to be more. It’s cheap and located in a safe area that is an easy walk to Disneyland for those who don’t want much from their hotel except value. If you’re considering the Grand Californian as an alternative, this is not going to be the hotel for you. It’s far (FAR!) from the best hotel in Anaheim, but if you’re going to be spending all day in the parks, anyway, it’s not a bad option. Other hotels that are similarly priced are going to be scary or farther away…or both.
If you’re heading to Disneyland for the Diamond Celebration, check out our Ultimate Guide to the Disneyland 60th Anniversary Diamond Celebration. We also have tons of other posts to help you plan, including our Tips for Saving Money on Disneyland Tickets, a look at Disneyland Area Hotel Reviews & Rankings, our Unique Packing List for Disney Trips, an index of our Disneyland Resort Restaurant Reviews, and a number of other things in our comprehensiveDisneyland Trip Planning Guide!
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YOUR THOUGHTS…
Have you stayed at Americas Best Value Inn & Suites Convention Center? Are you a fan of it? Did you find your room to be good enough? Do you prefer staying off-site or on-site at Disneyland? Please share your thoughts or questions in the comments section below!
Have never stayed at this one but have had a weird experience at one on a road trip. Surprisingly the brand tied for first place economy with JD Powers in 2023.
Did anybody reply and tell u that it is roach infested
This is way way nicer than a few years back pre-renovation.
I’d consider it for the $70 now, although, it’s still a pretty good walk compared to say the Quality Inn which you can usually get for a similar rate.
If you can get the Quality Inn for a similar rate, I’d definitely go for it.
When I saw that you were reviewing this place I started laughing. You see, my husband and I stayed at this place a few years ago. I had booked it based on price and convenience to the parks. My feeling at the time was that since we would be spending most of our time at the parks we really didn’t need much in a hotel room. However, when we got there my husband commented that we really needed to start spending more money for our hotel rooms! Needless to say, this place no longer makes the list for possible places to stay when we visit Disneyland.
Yea! You’re in my RSS feed again! Thank you!
It took me long enough, but it turns out the solution was waaaay simpler than I thought. It ended up being like a 2 minute fix. I guess I need to learn more about web design! 🙂
We are booked at Anaheim Desert Inn and Suites next week and we are paying $79 a night which I think is a better option than this place.
Anaheim Desert Inn & Suites is way better than this hotel, especially at that price. We just entered off-season, so rates are dropping.
Sorry, Tom, I have to disagree. Americas Best Value is a unscrupulous chain that allows some managers to out and out steal from clients- mostly women. If you check the TripAdvisor reviews for the one near PIT airports, for example, you’ll see many one star reviews that not only say the rooms were filthy but that the staff was rude , double-charged and also would not honor reserved prices.
My wife had this happen to her and a letter to the Corporate Offices was simply sent to that local staff. If the Corporate Headquarters of a chain is that unresponsive to such a big problem, they dont deserve to get business from anyone at any of their hotels. Americas Best Value needs to clean up their act.
Wow…I had no idea. I just Googled “Americas Best Value unscrupulous chain” and some of the stories are really disturbing. I’m going to update the post with that caveat–thank you for bringing it to my attention.
I swear this is the refurbished version of the old Rip Van Winkle motel from back in the 60’s. We actually stayed there in the late sixties, and that room looks almost identical to how it looked then. And yes, it was odd even back in those days. It was actually 2 motels operating as one, but I can’t remember the other’s name. Boy, this brings back good memories.
Very interesting! I *think* it’s still two. I don’t know what the Fantasy in the Skies Suites are, otherwise.
Stayed here on my most recent trip, the place is clean, the rooms are relatively big, and the distance from it to the parks is good. There’s also a decent selection of dining nearby since it is right next to the Gardenwalk.